This morning's Gospel reading included the section of Matthew 6 which contains "The Lord's Prayer." In Matthew, the prayer is part of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. It is not (as recorded elsewhere) in response to a request from the disciples that he would teach them to pray. The prayer is among Jesus' instructions; the prayer is intertwined with his sermon.
He does introduce the prayer by telling us that some pray for mixed reasons. There are some (he calls them "Gentiles") who "heap up empty phrases", thinking "that they will be heard for their many words."
He begins, "Our Father....:"
When we are together, we often pray this prayer. I realized some time back, that too often this prayer was becoming a method for signaling that our time together was at an end. We finish our Bible study, we repeat together the Lord's Prayer. The business of the Council is over, we close with the Lord's Prayer. It is always appropriate to pray this prayer, so long as it is "prayed," and not "said together" as a way of dismissing folks to their other activities. When used in this way, it concerns me that even this wonderful prayer has become "empty phrases."
God forbid that we would ever allow the phrases of this prayer to become "empty."
I imagine most of us know this prayer by heart. Knowing it by heart, it is easy to repeat it from memorization. Memorizing something differs significantly from knowing something by heart. In the case of the latter, we have taken the thing into us and have made it part of the life-blood that courses through us and all that we do. It isn't recalling a collection of words and phrases; it is exposing what is at the very core of our being.
We will continue to pray together the Lord's Prayer. In so doing, we are reminded of the petitions which should go into every prayer. Let us promise each other than when we repeat these often repeated words, we will reflect (and perhaps share) how this ancient prayer is taking new roots in our life with this recitation.
Monday, February 28, 2011
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment